The Economics of Optimal Growth

Pathways: Evaluating the Health of the

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S. Niggol Seo

The Economics of
Optimal Growth
Pathways
Evaluating the Health of
the Planet’s Natural and
Ecological Resources
The Economics of Optimal Growth Pathways
 S. Niggol Seo

The Economics of
Optimal Growth
Pathways
Evaluating the Health of the Planet’s Natural
and Ecological Resources
S. Niggol Seo
Muaebak Institute of Global Warming Studies
Bangkok, Thailand

ISBN 978-3-031-20753-2    ISBN 978-3-031-20754-9 (eBook)

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-20754-9

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer
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 Preface

The planet we live in is endowed with many kinds of valuable natural

resources—including plants, animals, trees, fuels, lands, oceans, and atmo-
sphere—which are relied upon by human beings for their survival and
prosperity. It is a central quest of economics to explicate the best ways to
utilize these resources, that is, in the manner that maximizes the welfare of
people on the planet, over an unforeseeable time horizon. On the other
hand, a nation’s economy is built crucially on how its people utilize the
precious natural resources, in addition to the technological, cultural, and
intellectual resources its people advance. The same can be said of the
global economy as well.
Can a nation’s economy be managed in a way for it to continue to grow
along an optimal economic growth pathway over an infinite time horizon?
This question has intrigued many intellectuals over the past two centuries.
What has intrigued even more intellectuals is the conundrum of whether
a nation’s economy, or the planet’s economy if pertinent, can be managed
for it to continue to grow over time, despite the hard reality of the eventu-
ally fixed stocks of natural resources on the planet.
This book entitled “The Economics of Optimal Growth Pathways:
Evaluating the Health of the Planet’s Natural and Ecological Resources”
puts forth a lucid answer to these questions of great importance to the
future of the planet and its people. It takes an extensive historical approach
by tracing the history of economic thoughts during the past two centuries
that has engaged the two vital economic questions: managing natural
resources efficiently on the one hand and managing national economic
growth optimally on the other.

v
vi PREFACE

At the core, this book demonstrates that the two questions are interde-
pendent. That is, the first question cannot stand alone without the second
question, and vice versa. In other words, it is neither rational nor persua-
sive for a serious thinker to approach the first question relying on one set
of principles while approaching the second question relying on another
different set of principles.
For an exposition of the natural resource use questions, the present
author provides a critical review of the following six literatures: David
Ricardo’s rent theory applied to croplands in Chap. 2, von Thunen’s spatial
land use theory in Chap. 3, Martin Faustmann’s forest harvest rotation
economics in Chap. 4, Harold Hotelling’s fossil fuel economics in Chap. 5,
a bio-economics of fisheries in Chap. 6, and Irving Fisher’s capital assets in
Chap. 7.
For an exposition of the national economic growth questions, the pres-
ent author provides a review of the following five literatures: Irving Fisher’s
theory of capital and interest rate in Chap. 7, Frank Ramsey’s theory of
national savings in Chap. 8, Robert Solow’s modern economic growth
theory as capital accumulation in Chap. 9, Tjalling Koopmans’s optimal
economic growth path in Chap. 10, and William Nordhaus’s optimal tra-
jectory of price of carbon dioxide in Chap. 11.
In common to the two categories of economic inquiries, each of the
above ten literatures is concerned with a dynamic trajectory of a primary
variable of interest in the respective literature. For the inquiry on fossil
fuels, for example, an efficient long-term management of a petroleum well
will lead to a dynamic trajectory of the Hotelling rent. For the inquiry of
the Koopmans’s national economic growth model, a societally welfare
optimizing management will lead to a dynamic pathway of the economy’s
capital accumulation or the society’s consumption.
In each chapter of this book from Chap. 2, the chief economic theory
selected for the topic addressed in the chapter, elaborated in the above, is
first described. This is then followed by a description of one or two major
critiques against the theory. These critiques that appear across the ten
chapters are then synthesized at the final chapter of this book, Chap. 13.
The present author calls them collectively in the final chapter a sub-­optimal
growth critique or a post-growth critique alternatingly. The sub-optimal
or post-growth critiques are in turn classified into three streams of
thoughts: a sustainable development critique, an ecological economics cri-
tique, a degrowth critique.
Tjalling Koopmans provides the most comprehensive answer to the
afore-described questions relating to the concept of optimal economic
 PREFACE vii

growth, which was in fact the title of his 1963 article. If the national
economy were to be managed in a way that achieves the societal welfare
optimum, he clarifies, it should grow at a rate that approximates the rate
of population growth plus the discount rate plus the rate of unforeseeable
technological progress, all of which again depend, inter alia, on market
interest rate, social inequality aversion, and consumption patterns.
Koopmans’s optimal economic growth pathways are well conceptual-
ized to unfold over a very distant time horizon while simultaneously
addressing the resource constraints of the planet as well as the negative
side-effects of the economic activities. The former includes, inter alia,
numerous ecological limits. The latter includes, inter alia, environmental
pollution and global climate change. The way it does so is well illustrated
by, inter alia, William Nordhaus’s climate and economy model, the topic
of Chap. 11.
The resource constraints, limits, availabilities are well clarified in this
book via the six chapters, from Chaps. 2 to 6, devoted to the natural
resource economic questions such as croplands, grazing lands, urban
lands, forests, fossil fuels, and fish species. The unintended consequences
of the economic activities are extensively addressed in this book in multi-
ple chapters including the chapters on fossil fuels, marine resources, capital
growth, and global climate change respectively.
To put Koopmans’s conclusion in the context of Irving Fisher’s theory
on capital and interest, a nation’s economy will grow in dependence on
individuals’ preferences, technological possibilities, and the mutually ben-
eficial exchanges that people strike in marketplaces. This conclusion or
insights are surely extendable to the planet’s economy as well.
It is the present author’s sincere aspiration that this book puts forth a
novel contribution to the humanity’s understandings of a better manage-
ment of natural resources and life on the planet as well as a better manage-
ment of the planet’s economy. The present author would also like to
express deep gratitude to William Nordhaus, Robert Shiller, and Robert
Mendelsohn, through whom the present author was able to get in inti-
mate contacts with the great economists introduced in this book, notably,
Tjalling Koopmans, Irving Fisher, and Robert Solow.
Finally, the present author would like to thank the editorial team at
Palgrave Macmillan especially Wyndham H. Pain and Ruby Panigrahi for
their outstanding teamwork to get this book produced and promoted.

Bangkok, Thailand S. Niggol Seo

 Contents

1 An
 Introduction to the Economics of Optimal Growth
Pathways and the Health of Natural and Ecological
Resources  1

2 Ricardo’s Rent 33

3 Von Thunen’s Spatial Land Use: Grasslands and Cities 59

4 Faustmann’s Forest Harvest Rotation 83

5 Hotelling’s Fossil Fuel Economics113

6 Fisheries Bioeconomics Under Open Access141

7 Irving Fisher’s Capital and Interest161

8 Frank Ramsey’s Optimal Savings181

9 Robert Solow’s Modern Economic Growth191

10 Tjalling Koopmans’s Optimal Economic Growth209

11 William Nordhaus’s Optimal Carbon Tax Trajectory235

ix
x Contents

12 The
 Economics of Optimal Growth Pathways with
Managing Natural Resources Efficiently265

13 Tendencies for Sub-optimal or Post-growth Pathways295

Index315
 About the Author

S. Niggol Seo is a natural resource economist who specializes in the

study of global warming and globally shared goods. He received a PhD
degree in Environmental and Natural Resource Economics from Yale
University in May 2006 with a dissertation on microbehavioral models of
global warming. Born in a remote rural village in South Korea in 1972, he
was invited for a doctoral study at UC Berkeley, University of Oxford, and
Yale University. Since 2003, he has worked on various World Bank proj-
ects on climate change in Africa, Latin America, and Asia. He held profes-
sor positions in the UK, Spain, and Australia from 2006 to 2015. He
received an Outstanding Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy Article
Award from the Agricultural and Applied Economics Association (AAEA)
in Pittsburgh in June 2011. He has published eleven books on climate
change, pandemics, and globally shared goods. He is the editor-in-chief of
the Handbook of Behavioral Economics and Climate Change published
in 2022.

xi
 List of Figures

Fig. 1.1 Structure of the book 23

Fig. 2.1 Value of the US Croplands in two states: Iowa and Nebraska.
(Source: USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service
(USDA 2021)) 44
Fig. 2.2 Land value versus net income in the US farmlands. (Source:
USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service (USDA 2021)) 45
Fig. 2.3 World population explosion presented by the Rome Club
Report46
Fig. 2.4 The food security problem in the Rome Club Report 48
Fig. 2.5 A pathway of crop production index, Thailand 50
Fig. 2.6 Pathways of cereal yield and production area, Thailand 51
Fig. 2.7 Pathways of food production and poverty rate in India 52
Fig. 3.1 The von Thunen model, original 62
Fig. 3.2 The von Thunen model, explained 66
Fig. 3.3 A hypothesis of land use changes versus climate change 70
Fig. 3.4 Observed land use choice changes from field crops to livestock
versus climate change 72
Fig. 3.5 Choice probabilities of farm animals versus climate change 73
Fig. 3.6 Major grasslands of the planet 76
Fig. 4.1 A typical forest stand growth and a forester rotation 88
Fig. 4.2 Maximum Sustainable Yield (MSY) rotation 91
Fig. 4.3 The Faustmann rotation versus the Forester’s rotations 94
Fig. 4.4 Trajectories of global deforestation over the past 30 years.
(Note: FAO’s Global Forest Resource Assessment 2022) 101
Fig. 4.5 A trajectory of carbon dioxide emissions from deforestation.
(Note: IPCC 2021) 102
Fig. 4.6 Rainforests of the planet 104

xiii
xiv List of Figures

Fig. 4.7 Forests and woodlands of the planet 105

Fig. 5.1 Trajectories of crude oil daily production. (Source:
OWID 2022) 117
Fig. 5.2 Global primary energy consumption by fossil fuels. (Source:
OWID 2022) 118
Fig. 5.3 Crude oil proved reserve. (Source: OWID 2022) 119
Fig. 5.4 Backward induction 122
Fig. 5.5 Energy transitions and backstop energy 126
Fig. 6.1 A fish biological growth function 145
Fig. 6.2 The harvest function 146
Fig. 6.3 The open access equilibrium 148
Fig. 6.4 Inefficient fishing effort under open access 149
Fig. 6.5 Private property equilibrium versus open access equilibrium 150
Fig. 6.6 An optimal harvest tax in the open access fishery 151
Fig. 6.7 An optimal tax on fishing effort 152
Fig. 6.8 Fish quota 153
Fig. 7.1 Determination of an interest rate 162
Fig. 7.2 A two-period model: technology determines the interest rate 163
Fig. 7.3 A two-period model: technology and preference determine
the interest rate 164
Fig. 7.4 Trade determines the interest rate 165
Fig. 9.1 A steady state in the Solow model 195
Fig. 10.1 Optimal economic growth path: production function 213
Fig. 10.2 The golden rule of capital accumulation 215
Fig. 10.3 Determination of kˆ ( ρ ) with the discount rate ρ222
Fig. 10.4 The effects of a small deviation from the optimal path 223
Fig. 11.1 Global temperature increase trajectories 237
Fig. 11.2 A calibration of real interest rate in the DICE model 247
Fig. 11.3 The damage function calibration in the DICE model 248
Fig. 11.4 A carbon price trajectory in DICE 2013 249
Fig. 11.5 Changes in the optimal carbon price trajectory in different
DICE versions 250
Fig. 11.6 An optimal control rate trajectory 251
Fig. 11.7 The industrial CO2 emissions trajectory 252
Fig. 11.8 A fat-tail distribution versus a medium-tail distribution in the
dismal theorem 254
Fig. 13.1 An illustration of the concept of ecological footprint 306
 List of Tables

Table 2.1 Ricardo’s rent from land fertility differences 37

Table 2.2 The short-term and long-term effects of agricultural
improvements40
Table 5.1 Fossil fuel proven reserves and years left to drill 120
Table 6.1 Recorded extinctions since 1600 155
Table 6.2 The number of threatened species by IUCN Red List 156
Table 7.1 The types of capital assets 165
Table 8.1 Determining a pure rate of time preference 187
Table 12.1 Resource sectors and theories 268
Table 12.2 Theories on national economic growth 279
Table 13.1 Sub-optimal growth critiques in individual chapters 296
Table 13.2 UN Millennium Development Goals, targets, and indicators 300
Table 13.3 UN 2030 Agenda for sustainable development 301
Table 13.4 The Agenda 21 in 1992 303

xv
 CHAPTER 1

An Introduction to the Economics

of Optimal Growth Pathways and the Health
of Natural and Ecological Resources

1.1   Introduction
If you are a natural resource manager of, say, four acres of cropland or two
hectares of forest stand, how would you manage it over your planning
time horizon? This is the first and most fundamental question you have to
answer in your brain before you get your hands and feet down and dirty.
Any reasonable answer would encompass many future time periods, that
is, beyond the single present time period, as well as a possibility of convert-
ing it to another land use at one future period or even selling it (Ricardo
1817; von Thunen 1826; Faustmann 1849).
The economics of optimal growth pathways, the book in your hands or
on your kindle presently, is written to provide a rational answer to this
question faced by the respective natural resource manager. The scope of
this book is, however, far greater than cropland farming or forest manage-
ment. This book starts with “four acres” of cropland in Chap. 2, continues
to the nation’s economy from Chap. 8 onwards, and ends big with the
planet’s atmosphere and the global economy from Chap. 11. The purview
of this book falls on the planet’s resources and the economic systems built
upon it.
Let me clarify this point from the first question in the above. If you are
a national economy’s manager, how would you manage it over your time
horizon? Can it be managed in a way that it grows at a rate that is optimal
for the society? Similarly, if you are a global decision-maker, how would

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature 1

Switzerland AG 2023
S. N. Seo, The Economics of Optimal Growth Pathways,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-20754-9_1
2 S. N. SEO

you manage the planet’s atmospheric changes such as global warming over
a very long horizon of planning? Can it be managed in such a way that is
most beneficial to the planet’s citizens and simultaneously protects the
nature (Solow 1957; Koopmans 1965; Nordhaus 1994a)?
This is one of the unique contributions of this book. In addressing the
question of economic growth, which is the core question of this book
entitled “The Economics of Optimal Growth Pathways,” which is raised
in the literature predominantly in the national economy’s context, this
book approaches it from the three different vantage points: individual
natural resource enterprises, a national economy, and the planet.
Across the three levels of viewpoint, a same fundamental question per-
vades: how should an “owner” of a respective resource manage the con-
cerned resource over the present and future time periods for the benefit of
“oneself” and others? It is the question of dynamic growth pathways with
respect to a concerned resource or economy.
In between the two extremities of scale, that is, a plot of cropland at a
local scale and a global atmosphere at a planetary scale, a national econ-
omy has stood most prominently in the corpus of intellectual inquiries on
economic growth dynamics. How should a national economy be man-
aged, that is, under what principles? What should be the ultimate goal in
managing a national economy over the present and future time periods?
Can it continue to grow, if so, is there an optimal rate of growth? These
are some of the questions that still powerfully intrigue many scholars as
well as the general public.
Understandably, the questions regarding the national economy appear
far more abstract than the questions regarding a cropland farmer or a for-
est stand manger. In addition, political powers and policy decisions rest
mostly within national boundaries based on the concept of national sover-
eignty, which makes the national economic decisions far more compli-
cated. For these reasons and others, the questions of how the nation’s
economy should be arranged and managed have been a prominent point
of debates and even conflicts among the economists since the very begin-
ning of economic science (Smith 1776; Malthus 1798; Ricardo 1817;
Marx 1867).
Economists have long espoused the vital importance of continued eco-
nomic growth of a nation, given that the economy’s aggregate output is
the sum of the values of the goods and services produced by all the eco-
nomic actors of the nation for the consumption by its people. The higher
the economy’s growth rate, the better. A slower growing economy will fall
 1 AN INTRODUCTION TO THE ECONOMICS OF OPTIMAL GROWTH… 3

behind a faster growing economy eventually at some point over the long
run, which would be a harbinger of a declining country.
Extending this logic, can we say that a nation’s economy should be
arranged in such a way that it continues to grow in the manner that maxi-
mizes the society’s welfare? Put differently, should a nation’s economy be
managed with the goal of achieving an optimal rate of economic growth?
A large majority of economists would agree on this thesis (Ramsey 1928;
Fisher 1930; Solow 1957; Friedman 1962; Koopmans 1965;
Nordhaus 2008).
Having said that, there are many and diverse groups of economists,
semi-economists, and non-economists who would vehemently disagree on
the thesis. The antagonists of economic growth place their emphasis on
numerous points, including, inter alia, the limits of continued economic
growth, negative consequences of economic growth, unsustainable devel-
opment, ecological thresholds and limits, global climate change, social
inequalities, and racial injustice (Meadows et al. 1972; Daly 1973; WCED
1987; Costanza 2010). To them, the pursuit of continued economic
growth is by and large a misguided endeavor. The most extreme of these
critiques referred to as degrowth theorists would argue unequivocally that
the national economy is better off by a zero growth or even a negative
growth (PDED 2008).
The essential question that this book addresses is this: Which growth
pathways should the nation, or the globe if appropriate, pursue in “man-
aging” its economy? This book will present the concept of optimal eco-
nomic growth established in the economics literature. This concept will be
elucidated against the backdrop of the alternatives which espouses sub-­
optimal economic growth or post-growth pathways in one way or another.
Although the question of the national economy’s growth appears far
more abstract and complex, the inquiry of managing a plot of cropland or
a hectare of forest stand does not appear to be that way. On the contrary,
it appears, at least at the first glance, to be rather concrete and straightfor-
ward. If that is indeed the case, why the question of the whole economy
appears so difficult to handle while the questions regarding the individual
natural resource sectors which constitute the national economy appear to
be so straightforward to take on? An important message that this book
delivers, which is hoped, is that the question regarding the national econ-
omy cannot be answered successfully independently of addressing the
questions of the individual sectors and enterprises in the economy, and
vice versa.
4 S. N. SEO

Of the component sectors of the economy which are diverse, this book
puts a spotlight on those that hinge critically on natural and ecological
resources. This is because, among other reasons, the aforementioned cri-
tiques against the pursuit of optimal economic growth path are formu-
lated on the concept of limits, thresholds, critical values regarding these
resources that were made available by the planet (Meadows et al. 1972).
The individual sectors to be covered in this book are cropland agriculture,
spatial land uses including grasslands and cities, forest resources, fossil
fuels such as coal, crude oil, and gas, marine resources including fishes in
the oceans. The financial sector whose exposition comes after the exposi-
tions of these resources will offer bridges to and across all these sectors
(Ricardo 1817; von Thunen 1826; Faustmann 1849; Hotelling 1931;
Gordon 1954; Fisher 1930).
The analysis of the nation’s macro economy will follow the chapters on
the individual natural resource sectors. It begins again with the financial
sector where the concepts of capital and interest rate are defined, which is
followed in sequence by a theory of national saving rate, a modern eco-
nomic growth theory through capital accumulation, a theory of optimal
economic growth pathway, and a theory of a globally harmonized carbon
tax (Fisher 1906, 1930; Ramsey 1928; Solow 1957; Koopmans 1965).
The last of these is explicitly concerned with the global economy and the
planet’s resources, that is, beyond the national economy (Nordhaus
1991, 1994a).
The expositions from Chap. 2 to Chap. 11 will pave the way for the
present author to offer a general description of the economics of optimal
economic growth pathways in Chap. 12 synthesizing all the theories in the
preceding chapters. This again will be reviewed in the milieu of the fervor
in today’s societies across the planet toward non-optimal as well as post-­
growth pathways whose synthesis will appear in Chap. 13.

1.2  Natural Resources and Life on Earth

The host of theories on how a nation should pursue its economy’s growth,
many of which were mentioned above, has much to do with natural
resources on the planet as well as marine and terrestrial life on Earth. The
reason is straightforward: It would be extremely hard, if not impossible,
for one to find any economically productive work produced without any
reliance on some natural resources or sentient animals. Final products of
the economic production processes, whether they be foods, clothes,
 1 AN INTRODUCTION TO THE ECONOMICS OF OPTIMAL GROWTH… 5

houses, medical products, vehicles, art works, temple tankas, or others,

should come from some combinations of the resources and animals that
nature provides.
That being the case, it is not surprising that at the heart of the countless
debates and conflicts regarding an appropriate economic growth pathway
of a society lies the concern on the wellbeing of at least one of the planet’s
natural resources and animals cherished by people. It may be as grand as
monarch butterflies, Asian tigers, or California redwood. Alternatively, it
may be as unnoticeable as mountain frogs, soils, or grasses to com-
mon people.
In describing and analyzing the various theories of economic growth in
this book, the present author gives a spotlight to the health and wellbeing
of natural resources as well as of marine and terrestrial life that the planet
is endowed with or nourished by the planet. Coupling the relevant eco-
nomic theories with the biological stock and flow data of some of the most
concerned resources, this book will lay out a framework for evaluating the
present status of these resources against the milieu of the critics’ deep
concerns.
The natural resources examined in Chap. 2 are croplands where a large
portfolio of different kinds of crops are cultivated worldwide. Major staple
crops are most familiar to people, such as wheat, rice, corn, and soybeans.
But, a list of the crops that are essential for the humanity’s consumption
and wellbeing is very long, to mention major categories of them only,
cereals, vegetables, tubers and root crops, pulses and beans, tree crops
such as coffee, non-timber forest products such as mushrooms, fibers such
as cotton and flax, and cash crops such as tobacco (Seo 2016a, b, c).
Croplands have always been a hotbed for fierce debates among con-
cerned people as far as we can remember, whose core point of disagree-
ments is centered around the term “food security” (Malthus 1798; Ricardo
1817). Will the croplands on Earth continue to be as fertile and abundant
as to feed the planet’s citizens whose number has increased over sevenfold
since the beginning of the twentieth century? This debate kicked off at a
global scale by the famed Rome Club Report entitled the “Limits to
Growth” in as early as 1972, but has not relented at all since then
(Meadows et al. 1972; World Bank 2008, 2009). The recent battle field in
the planet’s food security debate lies around the concern on the impacts of
global climate change on food security (IPCC 1990, 2014; Seo 2014,
2015; Schlenker and Roberts 2009).
6 S. N. SEO

The natural resources given a spotlight in Chap. 3 are other types of

land use than croplands, especially grasslands and urban lands (von Thunen
1826). The grasslands are often forgotten lands in the minds of critics who
are concerned about food security. To the eyes who are keen on fertile
croplands, grasslands tend to appear as a wasted land, that is, a land of no
worth. To them, the grasslands are von Thunen’s wilderness.
This is an uninformed perception of the grasslands. The land surface of
the planet is in fact dominated by the grasslands, the fact which eludes
most people’s perception. To be specific, the grassland biome is the largest
land biome of Earth, covering about 40% of the land surface (WRANGLE
2020). Readers may have not been to one of the world’s most sublime
grasslands, but I am quite sure that you have heard much during your life
about various legends from there. Some of the most famed are the Pampas
grasslands in South America, the Steppe grasslands in Mongolia and
Eurasia, the Prairie in North America, the Savannah grasslands of Africa,
the outback rangelands of Australia and New Zealand, and the Tibetan
Plateau grasslands on the Himalayas (Seo 2021a, b).
The grassland biome of Earth is richly endowed with natural and eco-
logical resources. A large variety of grasses live or are grown by people
there. The biome is also perhaps the favorite homes of many animal spe-
cies and plants. As for the humanity, it has long been a place for animal
raising for human consumption and trades (Seo 2006; Seo and Mendelsohn
2008). The animals that can feed on rich grassland resources are favored
by people who are keen on economic utilizations, the most salient of
which are horses, cattle, yaks, buffaloes, sheep, and goats. For example,
the Pampas grasslands are the biggest producer and exporter of cattle on
the planet (Lanfranco et al. 2022).
In a major contrast, urban lands are located at the opposite side of the
grasslands across the fertile croplands. People perceive urban lands as pre-
cious lands as the value of urban lands far exceeds, on average, that of rural
lands. Urban lands are largely dominated by commercial land uses as well
as residential land uses. Instead of plants and animals, urban lands are
populated densely by humans and large man-made structures, but also
where largest markets are located for exchanges of goods and services.
Forests are the next natural resources on the planet this book examines
in Chap. 4. No one would be doubtful of the value and benefits of trees
and forests to humans and other life forms, but only a small fraction of the
people would be in a position to manage a large number of trees and a still
 1 AN INTRODUCTION TO THE ECONOMICS OF OPTIMAL GROWTH… 7

smaller fraction of the people on Earth in a position to manage a forest-

land for many decades.
Trees are one of the most valuable resources for humanity. Timbers are
used as building materials. Pulps are used for paper making. For rural
areas, trees offer many types of food and health resources, to name just
some, coconuts, apples, persimmons, mushrooms, gums, and numerous
medicinal plants (Vedeld et al. 2007; Seo 2010, 2016b). Until the expan-
sion of fossil fuels at the beginning of the twentieth century, trees had
been the most important fuel for heating and cooking. For the beings on
the planet other than Homo sapiens, trees also offer favorite habitats to
them, say, birds and animals.
An examination of the forest management practices that were popular
historically offers an intriguing example of the debates among economists
and practitioners on the dynamic management methods of natural
resources (Samuelson 1976; Mendelsohn and Neumann 1999). Trees are
renewable resources, as such, the point of dynamic management is to find
the years at which the stand of trees should be cut for sale. Multiple theo-
ries of forest management which have been practiced by foresters world-
wide for centuries would offer a refreshing insight on the society’s dynamic
management of the economy. An economically optimal management of
forest resources over time is referred to as the Faustmann rotation, which
is the main theory to be explored in Chap. 4 (Faustmann 1849).
Chapter 5 shifts the focus of analysis to non-renewable resources, also
called exhaustible resources, specifically the fossil fuels such as coal, crude
oil, and natural gas. These energy sources collectively and individually are
strictly limited in its available quantity for human consumption (Hubbert
1956). Given the total stock that is fixed, an elucidation of the dynamic
extraction pathways that are most beneficial to humanity has long been
one of the most fascinating areas of economics and policy studies during
the twentieth century (Hotelling 1931; Devarajan and Fisher 1981). An
advance in new technologies may “drastically” increase the amounts of
recoverable fossil fuels for a limited period of time, as evidenced in the
hydraulic fracture technology at the beginning of the twenty first century
which led to the natural gas boom in the US and elsewhere (Joskow 2013).
The fossil fuels are resources of exceptional importance to the human
civilization. Unlike any other fuels such as fuel woods, bio fuels, wind
energy, or solar energy, the energy density of the fossil fuels is exceedingly
high, which enables the functioning of the present global economy via a
massive supply of energy and electricity every day. As of 2022, the planet
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of A boy's text
book on gas engines
 This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United
States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with
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Title: A boy's text book on gas engines

a book for boys describing and explaining in simple
language the automobile gas engine

Author: Fay Leone Faurote

Release date: October 31, 2023 [eBook #71991]

Language: English

Original publication: United States: Robert Smith Printing Co,

1908

Credits: Charlene Taylor and the Online Distributed

Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file
was produced from images generously made available
by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A BOY'S

TEXT BOOK ON GAS ENGINES ***
 Transcriber’s Note
Larger versions of most illustrations may be seen by right-
clicking them and selecting an option to view them separately,
or by double-tapping and/or stretching them.
Additional notes will be found near the end of this ebook.
The source book did not have a Table of Contents. The
one below was created for reader convenience.
INTRODUCTION
THE FOUR-STROKE CYCLE.
THE CYLINDER
VALVES
THE PISTON
THE CRANK SHAFT
THE CONNECTING ROD
THE CRANK CASE
THE CARBURETOR
THE IGNITION SYSTEM
THE COOLING SYSTEM
THE TWO-CYCLE MOTOR.
INDEX
 A

BOY’S TEXT BOOK

ON

GAS ENGINES

¶ A Book for
Boys Describing
and Explaining
in Simple
Language the
Automobile Gas
Engine.

By FAY LEONE FAUROTE, B. S. [M. E.]

(Former Instructor Detroit Motor School)
 Published by the Author
LANSING, MICHIGAN, U. S. A.
 Copyright by
Fay Leone Faurote
1908

ROBERT SMITH
PRINTING CO.
CHICAGO—
LANSING
 PREFACE
Knowing that the motor car is fast becoming the modern form of
transportation, both in the social and commercial world, and feeling
that the principles of the mechanism which constitutes its propelling
power are as yet somewhat of a mystery to the average individual
and to “Young America” in particular, the author feels that some of
the simple explanations offered in the following pages of this book
will be welcomed and appreciated. While they do not cover the entire
subject, it is hoped that they may tend to shed some light, and in a
way make understandable the construction and operation of the
automobile gas engine.
FAY L FAUROTE.
November 25, 1907.
A Four-cylinder Motor, so sectioned that it shows interior of cylinder,
valves, piston, crank shaft and connecting rods.
 A BOY’S TEXT BOOK
ON GAS ENGINES

INTRODUCTION
Boys, when I was a small boy, I remember how much I was
interested in everything which was mechanical. The engineer was
my hero; the solving of the mysteries of an engine and the learning
how to drive one, was my ambition.
I remember well how I tried to read the dry, technical description
of motors, steam engines and such things. I remember, too, how
hard it was to understand those books; how the various technical
terms used to bother me, until at last, in despair, I would throw the
books aside. It seemed as if the men who wrote them never realized
that boys existed,—that boys wanted to know about such things.
At other times how glad I was when I found a good-hearted
engineer who seemed to know and understand my feelings and my
desire to learn. How easy it was to comprehend his explanations,
because he used homely, everyday things to illustrate his meaning.
He made you forget there was anything complicated about
machinery. He simply took up one part at a time, and when he had
finished with it, everything was as plain as the nose on your face.
Boys, then and there I decided that if I ever did understand some
of these seeming mysteries of engineering, I would write a book that
boys could understand. I would write it so that they couldn’t help it, it
would be so plain; there would be no secrets; they should know all
about it, and what is more, should be able to reason it all out for
themselves.

Fig. 1—The Essential Parts of a Gas Engine.

Let me tell you about each part separately. After we have gone
over each part you will find that you will understand the action of the
motor and other parts of the car well enough so that you will
unconsciously reason it all out for yourselves. Some of the
descriptions and explanations may at first seem unsatisfactory, but I
think with a little thought and study you will be able to master them in
a short time. I want your confidence, boys, and then I know we will
get along all right together.
Fig. 2—A Single-cylinder Horizontal Engine. Note location of valves
in this type.
Suction Stroke Compression Stroke Working Stroke Exhaust
Stroke
Fig. 3—Four views of a section of a Vertical Cylinder, showing
position of valves, pistons and cams for the four different strokes.
 THE FOUR-STROKE CYCLE.
This subject looks like a bugbear, doesn’t it. Well, it is one of the
first things of which we shall have to dispose, and so we’ll tackle it
right away. We will start backwards, and take the word cycle first. If
you will look in the dictionary you will find that this word means “a
circle or orbit; an interval of time in which a succession of events is
completed, and then returns in the same order.”

Suction Stroke
Compression Stroke
Working Stroke
Exhaust Stroke
Fig. 4—A Four-cycle Diagram, showing
sequence of strokes in this type of motor.

This does not mean very much to you, does it? Well, let us go into it
a little farther. Supposing you were running relay races around a
block; you would run down on one side, across on another, back on
the other side, and then back to the starting point, wouldn’t you? You
would have completed a cycle then because you have taken a
“certain time in which a succession of events (streets) has been
completed” and you are back again at the start ready to “return in the
same order.”

Fig. 5—Drawing showing comparison between gas engine and a

cannon connected with a grindstone.

There is not anything complicated about that, is there? In other

words just change the four-stroke cycle to a four-street circle, and
this will help you to keep in mind the meaning of this term. Do you
remember last Fourth of July when you had your cannon out, how
many things you had to do to fire it, or in other words to complete the
cycle of operations. You did four things, didn’t you?
No. 1. You put in the powder.
No. 2. You rammed it in with a ramrod.
No. 3. You fired it by touching a match to it.
No. 4. You cleaned it out.
 You had gone around your four-sided circle, and were back
again, at the start, ready to do the same things over again. You were
running a gas engine then, only you did not realize it.
Let us assume for the sake of argument, that you had a bullet in
your cannon, and that to this bullet was connected a rod which had
its other end fastened to the crank of a grindstone. Then if the barrel
of the cannon was long enough, and the rod which connected the
bullet and crank was short, the bullet could not get out of the cannon
barrel, could it? It would therefore have to go back and forth very
much like the pedal on a grindstone does. Of course the rod and the
crank would have to be very strong in order to keep the bullet in, but
we will assume that they are, and that the bullet must travel back
and forth inside the barrel. Now, if the bullet is going to stay in the
barrel we must provide some way to load the cannon, and also to
clean it out, therefore we will cut two holes in the end, one at I and
one at E, and then instead of using powder suppose you use some
explosive gas which will not leave so much soot behind it. You know
how a squirt gun works—how you draw the water in by pulling out
the plunger, and how you force the water out again by pushing it in
again.
 Fig. 6.

Let us work the cannon the same way. Let us call the farthest point
to which the bullet travels going in “H” and the farthest point to which
it travels going out “K.” Now let us assume that the bullet is at “H,”
and that it is just starting out in the direction of “K.” If we open the
hole “I” in the side of the cannon by taking out the plug “L,” and put a
hose, connected with our gas tank, in there, then the outward motion
of the bullet “P” will pull the cannon full of gas, won’t it? Before the
gas has a chance to escape we will put in the plug “L” again. Now
we have the cylinder full of gas, but as the bullet is at the end of its
stroke, and cannot go any further, we will have to push the gas
together again and get the bullet into position “H.” This will be a good
thing for the gas, because it will crowd the particles of it closer
together, and make it explode quicker, so we will do this. Of course,
in order to keep the gas in there we have had to close up the touch-
hole of the cannon, but now that we are ready to fire it, we will take
this plug out, and touch a match to the gas. An explosion follows,
and the bullet travels from the position “H” to the position “K.” All this